Family Tree
by Mari83
Summary: Secret Santa story for Shywr1ter. Max, Logan a tree and some memories. Trivial S1 and most certainly M/L.


_**Disclaimer**_: Don't own Dark Angel

_**A/N**_: _**Secret Santa story for Shywr1ter**_ in this year's Christmas in July.

Her wishes were:

**1) S1 setting -- still could be AU, but within time period of S1 or a continuation of events established in S1.** _At least this I managed._

**2) Some movement of Max and Logan getting closer: writer's choice about where their relationship starts and where it finishes, but during the story there is a change in status toward being closer.** _Jein… Definitely in my head while writing it, but even there only in an unspectacular, boring, gradual way…_

**3) Either Max or Logan teaches the other a new game -- and *something* ensues -- hilarity, competition, obsession, -- you name it!** _A lame attempt at that got the story started… and was lost along the way when the story mutated.  
_  
**4) At least one M & L scene is set in a place we've never seen Max & Logan together (in the show counts -- but extra points if, as far as you can tell, it's someplace they've never been together in fic, either!)** _Another Jein. Strictly speaking yes, probably, but that's like picking a random point on a map and declaring it formerly M/L-free territory.  
_  
**5) Would love to see some 'cousins' involved -- cross-over with Tony DiNozzo from NCIS as Logan's cousin. (can never get enough of them!)** _If memories and indirectness count… So another jein?_

So yeah, don't know if this counts… and it just doesn't flow!

xxxxx

**Family Tree**

xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

**Logan's Aztec, street adjoining the Cale estate, 11:10 AM**

"When I was ten Bennett almost got himself killed when he fell out of that tree there onto one of Margo's buffet tables."

Voice gentle with his smirk, Logan pointed to the huge, old chestnut tree stretching its branches over the reddish brick wall that encircled the far side of the Cale's park-like garden.

They were on their way back from Eyes Only's newest safe house, a former gardener's house conveniently hidden between stately mansions. Setting it up with supplies and an alarm system that impressed even Max, they had traveled through the unharmed part of town almost a dozen times now, each time passing by the Cale estate.

Someone less familiar with the frowns and scowls indicating Logan's mood might not have noticed his discomfort, how he tried to act as if it were just any house. Distractedly losing track of their conversation, his neck stiffened every time as he looked straight ahead, only his eyes darting sideways.

Knowing better than to press him, Max had waited for some kind of explanation, expecting the same cynic nonchalance that usually covered his family bitterness. Logan's tone, however, was light and amused, wistful almost as he threw in his remark in a way so typical for them ever since they'd started to dance around the edges of that something between them. Out of the blue, without really thinking, one of them would offer a memory, a thought or impression, evoked by some random trigger. It had been a lanky kid on a rolling vegetable box who'd reminded Logan of that very first skateboard he'd gotten from an older cousin. And it had been after the first snow of the year, wet and grey and unlike Wyoming's harshness, when she'd told him about her fear that the world outside of Manticore was nothing but bare, white forest.

Quiet and comfortable their words weaved in and out of the silence and discussions of their missions, dinners and chess games. Carefully kept inside, those memories were intense and fragile, dense with fragrance, emotion and the taste of firsts that would fade into nothing but words when exposed too often. Max wouldn't have minded if her early childhood pictures lost some of their acuity, often wishing for someone whose understanding would absorb the harshness … Logan, however, seemed to treasure his.

Leaning back into her seat, she watched him with calm interest. "I guess Margo wasn't that amused…."

Logan gave her a wry grin, turning his head to her for a half-shake. "No soccer camp for little Bennett that weekend. Not like it had been his fault in first place, but of course Margo didn't want to hear any of that that after he'd embarrassed her in front of everybody… "

Leaving the street for a moment, his absent gaze took her in, as if it trying to ease her presence with the pictures in his head. "She claimed that he'd ruined the traditional Cale Industries summer picnic. You know,the typical high society thing, gathering all the important people in our garden, business contacts, the mayor, neighbors, the respectable part of family… and that year… "

He shrugged and rubbed his forehead, hand hiding his face. "That year Margo had taken over, occupying the house just some months after my mother's death… doing everything to make her party more perfect than my mother's had been."

He paused, giving Max a moment to steal a glance back at the mansion, only the upper stories visible behind the wall's shield.

"We kids were supposed to look good and stay out of the way, so we'd sneaked off into my tree house just as we'd done all summer, hiding all kinds of stuff up there. And right under the tree was that big table, full with all kinds of fancy food. So my oldest cousin, no Cale", he added, countering her skeptic look, "came up with the idea that we should help ourselves, fishing for food with pieces of string and bent wire... which was lots of fun until Bennett lost balance, landing in a huge pile of shrimp canapés."

"That cousin, he was way too old for such nonsense. Actually he was supposed to keep us from doing anything stupid, but… " Another grin, boyish and nostalgic, suddenly making it easy for Max to imagine a younger Logan, probably as contrite over Bennett's punishment as giggling over his seafood covered appearance. "I guess he thought it was a good way to make us laugh after that first time without my mother."

They had long left his uncle's house behind, now pulling up to join the other cars waiting at the sector checkpoint and the prospect of returning to the shabby part of Seattle seemed enough to snap Logan out of his memories. "Anyway, did I mention that I found a real coconut on the market that you need to try tonight…?"

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**The Cale estate's garden, 4:30 AM**

It was a favor to Logan. At least that was what Max told herself, ignoring the fact that Logan didn't even know about her plans yet. If she was honest though, she was simply curious. Curious how the world had looked to him from up in his tree house, how it had been like to grow up in such an affluence of money and rules and conventions.

And so, long after their dinner had merged into yet another comfortable chess game, she'd sneaked back to this part of town, now swinging over the brick wall to softly land on the other side.

Getting up into the tree might have been a thrilling challenge to ten year old Logan, for Max it was only a matter of seconds. The tree house was still there, a simple, roofless platform edged between massive branches. Max was almost disappointed. For the most part of the year this must have been a damp, chilly place, more primitive even than Manticore's raised hides. And yet this was different. Overlooking the wide, empty lawn and the monumental house boasting with too many lifeless windows, this place up here, framed by leaves and branches, seemed like a refuge, something small and sheltered.

A place to store away memories, Max pondered, hoping to maybe find some leftovers of Logan's childhood. Searching, her fingers glided over the tree's rough bark, coming up empty until… Triumphing, she pulled out the angular item nestled into a knothole: A plastic container, airtight, indestructible and a precious possession in itself in a city infested with rats and cockroaches.

The dark blue lid came off easily, exposing a seemingly random assembly of memorabilia: A Swiss army knife and a miniature truck, an almost new baseball and a tiny stuffed rhinoceros that leant against a stack of old basketball tickets. Timid to touch, Max stared at the items that seemed so foreign and still offered a strange, timeless connection to Logan. It was odd to be here, to think that the last person holding these childhood treasures had been a much younger Logan leaving for college, or maybe teenage Bennett now alone with his parents.

Maybe, Max thought, it would be better to just put the box back, not to destroy the order of things. But there, underneath the dinosaur card game the corner of a photo lured her with a shard of the past, a version of Logan she couldn't have known. It shouldn't be her touching these things after all the time…. and still, after another moment of hesitation, Max carefully pulled the picture out, grateful for her night vision.

Three boys, caught by an aimless snapshot, their arms and legs sprawled out in the same spot Max occupied now. With Logan on the platform's left side, Max easily recognized Bennett's soft preschooler face on the right, framed by a surprising mop of dark curls. And there, in the middle, his long arms roughly hugging the younger boys' shoulders… was Logan again.

Squinting, Max brought the photo closer to her face, unmistakably identifying Logan as the kid on the left, maybe eight, ten years old… yet just as unmistakably the middle guy looked exactly like the 20-something Logan in the various family photos she'd spotted at Bennett's wedding. Only this guy's hair was trimmed shorter, smoothing his appearance as the clean-shaven face brought out the familiar chin line.

And yet, Max pondered as her gaze flickered between young Logan and his older pendant, certainly that non-Cale cousin he'd mentioned, she would never have mistaken the both. Maybe she'd simply gotten too used to every shade of Logan, but even on the still photo there was something about the both that was just… different.

Where the older guy's grin a was a picture of happy-go-lucky mischief, beaming with even more self-confident charm than Logan when she'd first met him, Logan was more reserved, less relaxed into the moment. His boyish frame wasn't spread out as carelessly as the young man next to him, wasn't as innocently snuggled into the crook of their middling cousin's arm as Bennett's soft child body. Even this young he looked more grown-up than he should have.

The most surprising, most poignant though was the expression on Logan's face. Vulnerable in awed admiration, he glanced up to his older cousin, his smile radiant with pure, unquestioned trust.

Max wished she'd ever known such happy security. But even before that long, long time when she wouldn't tell anybody anything, not even her real name, back when she'd still been with her siblings it had never been like that. Only a group of scared kids, huddled together for at least a bit of warmth and comfort, each and every of them had been helpless to the Colonel's decisions.

Logan and his cousin though… the young man on the picture was old enough that just simply the age difference would have made him Logan's idol, maybe to this day if he was still around somewhere. About ten years older than Logan, he must have been there to see him grow up, from sheltered toddler to lanky teenager, a constant after his parents' death and during the time with Jonas and Margo.

Intrigued, Max shifted the photo around again as if needing yet another confirming look that this guy indeed rather seemed like Logan's older twin than a cousin. It was as if Logan's face had been split into two, into untroubled and lighthearted, serious and brooding, both versions puzzling with alikeness and difference.

Shaking off her fascination, Max stood up. The grey leaves around her had taken a hint of color, a dim, grainy green. While she'd been sitting here, falling into Logan's past, night had shifted into early morning, making it risky to stay any longer. Sliding the photo inside her cat suit, she smiled faintly, thinking how she'd put it on top of his Eyes Only files in the morning, not bothering with words.

Then she put the box back where it had been. Maybe one day she would ask Logan what the other things in the box meant, would inquire what had made him and his cousin so different, why they had been close still. Until then, though, until Logan decided to come back, it would all be safe here.

xxx _**The End**_ xxx

Happy Christmas in July, Shy… and sorry if you gobble-read expecting a real story, missing my warnings on top.

(Thanks to Marcus Sylenus for creeping into Margo's head and putting a new story idea into mine:-)


End file.
